What we did with CSA box #6 and what's in #7

1. Broccoli & Bacon Salad 2. Zucchini Pickles (recipe to come) 3. Paella 4. Grated Zucchini for freezing 5. Summer Harvest Pizza on Honey Wheat Crust (recipe to come) 6. Classic Coleslaw 7. Grilled Zucchini with Chipotle Bacon Sauce 8. Creamy Sausage & Zucchini Pasta 9. Roasted Vegetable & Quinoa Salad

And on to box 7...

Cauliflower - We are going to roast this & have it with the leftover chipotle bacon sauce

Zucchini - Look for an upcoming post with lots of zucchini ideas

Sweet Spanish Onions - One has already been used in a Onion & Tomato Tart

Garlic

Peppers - Fajitas next week

Tomatoes - The first of the season. Mostly used in the tart mention above but the rest are going in bruchetta

Potatoes - We'll be taking Garlic Scape Potato Salad to a picnic tomorrow

Yellow & Green Beans - I'm going to blanch & freeze a bulk of these

Cucumbers - We're making pickles this weekend

Dill - Good for the pickles

Red Mizuna - Not sure how to use this mustardy green yet

Sauté Greens - Just a quick wilt with some garlic & these are a perfect side. This batch has such wonderful flavor.

Carrots - I think Matt is wanting some Morning Glory Muffins

Arugula

Find more ideas on using your CSA box at Cooking Away My CSA

If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://agoodappetite.blogspot.com OR at http://agoodappetite.com then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at katbaro AT yahoo DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author unless otherwise noted.
© 2007-2009 Kathy Lewinski

Lime Chipotle Pulled Pork with Chipotle Mustard Potatoes

Recently, I was contacted by Saucy Mama about entering a recipe in a cooking contest they are hosting. Other than the Foodie Joust & Iron Cupcake, I've never entered a recipe in a cooking contest so I thought why not plus there were some great prizes including a Kindle. They sent me a lovely assortment of their marinades, dressings & sauces to play with. I have to say we were impressed to see the ingredients in all of there products, it was all things we recognized instead of a bunch of chemicals. We were most drawn to the Lime Chipotle Marinade & it made me think of the Caribbean & then I thought of pork...pulled pork.

Saucy Mama was looking for recipes that were quick & easy for a family to prepare. Well, you can't get much easier than cooking in a crock pot. Throw everything in, walk away & hours later dinner is done. As for quick the hands on time on this recipe is no more than 10 minutes.

This made for such a tasty sandwich! Just a hint of spice (the perfect amount for a wimp like me) & a freshness from the lime. The meat was super juicy. I liked mine just plain on a roll while Matt topped his with some coleslaw & a slather of Saucy Mama's Chipotle Mustard for an extra kick. For a quick side dish we roasted some potatoes with the Chipotle Mustard. They got crispy & had a gorgeous color. Everything was served up with some steamed beans for a really easy statisfying meal.

Want to try making this dish yourself? Well I have four bottles of Saucy Mama's Lime Chipotle Marinade to give away. Leave a comment on this post & I'll pick four random winners on Thursday, August 13th. Please leave your email address in your comment so I can contact you. if you win! Sorry, I can only ship to the US and Canada.

Chipotle Lime Pulled Pork

hands on time: 10 minutes
cook time: 4 - 8 hours

1 1/2 lb pork shoulder
6 T Saucy Mama Chipotle Lime Marinade
3/4 c beer (We like the flavor beer adds but if you don't want to use it add chicken stock instead.)
1 t lime juice
4 soft rolls

Rub the pork shoulder all over with 4 tablespoons of the Chipotle Lime Marinade. Place in crock pot. Add the beer. Cover & turn the crock pot to high. Let cook on high for about 4 hours or low for 8 hours until the meat is fall apart tender. (If the meat is done before you are ready to serve just turn the crock pot to warm.)

With a slotted spoon take the meat from the crock pot & put into a bowl. Use a fork to shred the pork. Stir in 2 tablespoons of the Lime Chipotle Marinade and the lime juice.

Serve on rolls.

4 servings

Chipotle Mustard Roasted Potatoes

Hands on time: 5 minutes
Cook time: 30 minutes

16 small waxy potatoes, washed & cut into 1-inch pieces
2 T olive oil
2 heaping t Saucy Mama Chipotle Mustard

Preheat oven to 400 F.

Mix everything together in a roasting pan. Place in oven and let roast to 30 minutes until browning.

4 servings

If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://agoodappetite.blogspot.com OR at http://agoodappetite.com then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at katbaro AT yahoo DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author unless otherwise noted.
© 2007-2009 Kathy Lewinski

Daring Bakers' - Dark Chocolate Rum Milan Cookies

The July Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Nicole at Sweet Tooth. She chose Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies and Milan Cookies from pastry chef Gale Gand of the Food Network.

Ok, two days late but here is my version of the milans.

I didn't want to add citrus flavor so I added some rum flavoring I had sitting around to the cookies. I thought the cookies were quite sweet so I went with bittersweet chocolate for the filling. These cookies were really rather easy. The hardest part was making pairs the same size to get a pretty cookie. The few that I made just circular rather than oval actually came out nicer & I'll do that next time. The original recipe said it made 3 dozen so I cut that to 1/3 which still yielded 2 dozen (the recipe never states how big your piped cookies should be so perhaps mine were smaller). Below is the recipe adapted to the smaller size with my notes in italics.

Milan Cookies

Recipe courtesy Gale Gand, from Food Network website
(adapted to be 1/3 the original quantity)

4 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

2/3 cups + 2 T + 2 t powdered sugar

2 egg whites
2 t vanilla extract

1/2 t rum flavoring
1/2 cups all purpose flour

Cookie filling, recipe follows

Cookie filling:


2T + 2 t cup heavy cream
2 1/4 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
 I used bittersweet. Chop it very fine to get that small amount of cream to melt it.

1. In a mixer with paddle attachment cream the butter and the sugar. I just used the regular beaters & it seemed fine.
2. Add the egg whites gradually and then mix in the vanilla and rum flavoring.

3. Add the flour and mix until just well mixed.

4. With a small (1/4-inch) plain tip, pipe 1-inch sections of batter onto a parchment-lined sheet pan, spacing them 2 inches apart as they spread.
 I used the tip that the other tips attach to which was about 1/2-inch & piped the cookies to be about 1 1/2-inch long. I used a silpad instead of parchment paper.
5. Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 10 minutes or until light golden brown around the edges. Let cool on the pan.
 My cookies took between 13 & 15 minutes to get brown edges.
6. While waiting for the cookies to cool, in a small saucepan over medium flame, scald cream.
 If my microwave was working I would have just heated the cream & chocolate in there since the amount of cream was so small.
7. Pour hot cream over chocolate in a bowl, whisk to melt chocolate, add zest and blend well.

8. Set aside to cool (the mixture will thicken as it cools).

9. Spread a thin amount of the filling onto the flat side of a cookie while the filling is still soft and press the flat side of a second cookie on top.
 I did a thin amount & ended up with a lot of extra chocolate. Next time I'll do a thicker layer.
10. Repeat with the remainder of the cookies.

Makes about 2 dozen 1 1/2-inch long sandwich cookies

If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://agoodappetite.blogspot.com OR at http://agoodappetite.com then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at katbaro AT yahoo DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author unless otherwise noted.
© 2007-2009 Kathy Lewinski

A Midsummer MN Feast with Bacon Chipotle Sauce

Now here's a meal that just screams summer in Minnesota to me.

The first MN sweet corn of the season dripping with heavenly Hope, MN butter. Grilled grass-fed New York strip steak from Thousand Hills Cattle Company in Cannon Falls, MN. (I had the pleasure of sitting with the Churchill's, the founders of Thousand Hills, at FRESH and Tasty and they make you feel great about eating locally raised beef.) Thick grilled zucchini slices picked fresh from our garden topped with a Bacon Chipotle Slather Sauce. All eaten in the backyard on a warm summer's evening.

Ok, I'll admit Bacon Chipotle Sauce isn't very Minnesotan but it certainly makes everything else taste great & the bacon is Nueskes from WI. The sauce has an wonderful smokey flavor from the bacon and the chipolte plus a touch of sweetness from brown sugar and molasses. We used Muir Glen fire-roasted tomatoes which also upped the smoky flavor.

We put the sauce on the zucchini while it was grilling which gave the zucchini, a vegetable that can be bland, amazing flavor. I also liked it as a dipping sauce from the beef. I can only imagine it would be fabulous on a hamburger or hotdog.

Bacon Chipotle Slather Sauce
(by Tara Mataraza Desmond via Serious Eats)

2 slices thick-sliced bacon, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
4 large shallots, chopped
4 garlic cloves, chopped
2 T light brown sugar
1 T tomato paste
1/4 c malt vinegar
1/4 c water
2 T molasses
1 T Dijon mustard
1 T Worcestershire sauce
28-oz crushed tomatoes (we used diced & they worked just fine)
1 rehydrated, dried chipotle or chipotle in adobe (we took out the seeds for a mild sauce, leave them in for spicy)
salt & pepper

Heat a large pan over medium heat. Add the bacon & cook until its crisp. Add the shallots and garlic & cook them in the bacon fat for about 5 minutes until tender. Stir in the brown sugar & tomato paste. Then add the vinegar, water, molasses, mustard, Worcestershire, tomatoes & chipotle. Reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer for 30 minutes. Season to taste with salt & pepper.

Transfer to a blender & process until smooth. (Careful its hot!)

Store in the refrigerator or freeze to use later.

Makes 4 cups.

If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://agoodappetite.blogspot.com OR at http://agoodappetite.com then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at katbaro AT yahoo DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author unless otherwise noted.
© 2007-2009 Kathy Lewinski

Giant Vegetables and Weekly Menu 7/27 - 7/31

Despite the fact we've had a rather cool summer in Minnesota & are in the midst of a drought our little raised vegetable garden seems to be going crazy. Our tomato plants are so heavy with fruit they can barely stand despite the fact they are in cages.
One giant kohlrabi...

The hugest zucchini I've ever seen. Yeah, you'll be seeing zucchini on our menu.

Lotsa broccoli

Now these aren't big by any means but I'm happy to see our cherry tomatoes finally start to ripen.


On to Menu Planning Monday...

Cilantro Lime Pulled Pork Sandwiches

Chicken Peanut Noodles

Pizza with Zucchini, Fontina & Onions

Paella with Chorizo & Shrimp

Grilled Steak & Zucchini with Slather Sauce

If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://agoodappetite.blogspot.com OR at http://agoodappetite.com then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at katbaro AT yahoo DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author unless otherwise noted.

© 2007-2009 Kathy Lewinski